... music seems to help stimulate that creative process. I mean it's not that I can't work without music, I can, it's just that it seems to help me to really focus on what I'm doing, without having to think about what I'm doing, or even about how I am doing it - it's all a bit of a Zen thing I suppose, and I just wondered if anyone else did the same thing and it seems as though there are more than a few that do.

Do people ever ask you how you worked a particular image and the steps that you took to complete it, and you think to yourself 'you know what, I don't really know, I just sort of did it and here's the result', ..

Floating, cruising, sailing are words that come to mind. You're absolutely correct. I don't need to listen to music but find that it certainly helps, alleviates the whole process.

This thread has taken an interesting turn. Photography's association with music is of course related to all of the arts but music and photography do indeed seem to have a unique connection. I have always thought that it has to do with the non-verbal nature of each.

The most widely known photographer/musician is, of course, Ansel Adams who played piano his entire life and credited his study of piano with building in him the discipline for which his darkroom work is so well known. His biography tells of the difficulty of his decision between a photographic career or a musical career.

Paul Caponigro (the father) studied music at Boston University School of Music before turning to photography. He told me 30 some years ago how one of his goals was to have an exhibition during which he would give piano recital. I understand that he was later able to realize that goal.

There are many more photographer/musicians. One interesting case for Dave is probably the composer Felix Mendelssohn. Although he died in 1842 so didn't get much of a photographic chance, he was a painter of some repute and like both Adams and Caponigro, had to decide whether to pursue a career in art or music. He heavily illustrated his travel journals (see some of them here below) and only decided to pursue a musical career after his famous trip to the Hebrides in 1829. Hence the Mendelssohn festivals on both Mull and Skye each summer. I don't know if he actually made it to Skye but his time on Mull is well documented.

I have a music degree and have directed orchestras and bands as well as playing french horn professionally for 40 years. This may seem strange to many of you but I don't listen to any music when doing any other work. I cannot concentrate on anything else when music is playing. I simply cannot help myself, when music plays, I listen - to the detriment of most anything else. I rarely even play music when driving. When I play music, I stop and listen.

I understand this completely, and I generally prefer to work in a quiet environment. However, if I am performing some simple or tedious tasks, I may listen to classical music, but not the sort that commands my attention (e.g. Mahler). BTW, I have come to love Spotify. For $5/month, you can listen to a vast selection of music without commercial interruptions.

Edit: I just checked out Grooveshark. It is a dwarf compared to Spotify, at least in terms of classical music. Mostly, Grooveshark has excerpts and a few albums of any given piece, while Spotify has a huge selection of complete works. I don't know if Grooveshark is commercial-free or whether you have to buy a subscription to be spared obnoxious advertising.

Edit: I just checked out Grooveshark. It is a dwarf compared to Spotify, at least in terms of classical music. Mostly, Grooveshark has excerpts and a few albums of any given piece, while Spotify has a huge selection of complete works. I don't know if Grooveshark is commercial-free or whether you have to buy a subscription to be spared obnoxious advertising.

Rob

Already have a long playlist at Grooveshark. Thought I'ld ask you to see if you had any info on their history or who they are. Not much into classical music, but I can understand why Spotify would be your go to choice.

I'll have to thoroughly check their extent of their library which I'm sure is quite extensive considering they keep getting mentioned in the mainstream media.

I don't listen to anything. If I did it would just end up being tuned out as with some of the other posters. But I don't really listen to ambient music anyway, usually if I'm listenting thats all I'm doing (except for the inevitable mind wandering).

NPR news, tv news or nothing most of the time. Now...back in the 70's when I lived in L.A. I listened to Dr Demento in the wet darkroom.

I don't like PP all that much. Right now I have to do about 125 to 150 images for a Blurb book. I hate it. I did 50 images in 3 or 4 days. It feels like a never ending job. Each image is a one at a time job. Some of them may have over a dozen versions.

My personality wont let me do much else until the PP is done. Then I have to do book design. But I can take my time on that. But until I have the pix done, the book seems up in the air to me. After PP I print them all out and do a final revise. Then do a layout of the work prints for the design.

Luckily I was through writing for the books when I finished book #1. I wont have to write much until I get to book #10. With books # 2 to #9, I only have to write a 1 or 2 page intro and the rest is pix. I like that. I hate having to write.

PP is of the utmost importance in any case. Look at this example from a negative I just found last month after being lost for 40 years. (Nude warning)

OK, I was 19 when I did the wet print and not that great of a printer. The neg was terrible, underexposed and contrasty. Only light was the window. But even if Ansel Adams printed it, he is not going to get 2.5 hours of computer D&B into a 30 second exposure wet darkroom print.

for me, it's classic rock (70's and 80's) some days, classical music occasionally, but most days it's new age piano and guitar - David Lanz, Keiko Matsui, 7 & 5, Danny Heines, my personal favorite (who passed before his time) Michael Hedges, and a few others.

I've been following this three with interest as despite being a music junkie [I have even DJed for my sins], I don't tend to have any specific music to process to. Usually I get so absorbed I don't notice when it ends. What gets played tends to be quite random, usually the latest purchases.When writing film scripts however I use music as my muse or as soundtrack to scene I'm currently writing. Could be some dance music, could be a Metal band, could be orchestral.....

I do think that the kind of music I listen to or do not listen to has an impact on the resulting look of my images... but I am still trying to figure out the exact mapping.

The plan is to select semi-automatically the right music though an iTunes script that selects some random tunes matching a given theme as a function of some input parameters driven by the kind of image/processing.

I guess I'm boring - Smooth Jazz. The main reason is that it won't take my mind off my images by listening to lyrics. It's like having white noise that masks other interruptions.

Mark

one reason I like the new age. I like smooth jazz sometimes as well. Most rock either i've heard enough times i know the lyrics or it's a song I can't really understand the lyrics (quite a few fit that category for me). Now that I think about it, I tend to listen to rock when I'm sorting, key wording, and doing preliminary adjustments, but not when working on the final version.